Casanova
by Azhdarcho
Summary: Yugi makes a plan to ask Anzu out, but that may not be what she has on her mind.


**On ownership:** _Yu-Gi-Oh!_ is owned by Kazuki Takahashi.

**On ratings:** Rated T for swearing.

**On universes:** This story takes place in a post-canon universe featuring Egyptian!Not Dead!Atem.

**

* * *

Casanova**

"I think... I might ask Anzu out tomorrow."

"Hm?" said Atem, looking up from the gaming magazine he was reading. Yugi was supposed to be doing his homework, but even from his bed Atem could tell that at best he had been absent-mindedly doodling for the past hour.

"We've been pretty close the past couple weeks. Maybe I'll give it a try."

Atem set his magazine down on his lap. "So you're finally getting around to it? That's a pretty big decision there, aibou," he said. Atem thought back on the past few weeks. Anzu hadn't seemed especially interested in Yugi, but that was during the time they all spent together; maybe she was flirting with him at school when he wasn't around. She certainly had stayed interested in _him_, which was alternately annoying and embarrassing, depending on how Yugi was reacting to it. Either way, Atem was surprised that Yugi had decided to do this now.

"I don't really know what to do, though," said Yugi. He paused to chew on the end of his pencil. "I'm not going walk up to her and give her a huge kiss and ask her to love me for forever and ever or anything, but maybe I'll ask her if she wants to go... do something together sometime?" He ended his sentence uncertainly.

"You should totally just walk up to her and smooch her. I'm sure would work out perfectly for you," said Atem with a smirk as he pictured exactly what would happen; it involved black eyes and bruised egos.

"Oh, c'mon. No it wouldn't." Yugi threw the pencil at him.

Atem laughed and dodged it easily. "What, you don't trust my relationship advice?" he said.

"Well I would if you were actually giving me any instead of making fun of me." Atem kept laughing, and Yugi stuck his tongue out at him.

"Ok, ok, fine," said Atem, tossing the pencil back. Atem was always willing to help his romantically-challenged other self, especially if it meant that Anzu would stop hitting on him. "Well, what's something you can do? Isn't her dance recital tomorrow?"

"Yeah," said Yugi thoughtfully.

Atem sat up on the bed and turned to face Yugi at his desk. "So ask her if she wants to do something afterwards. You know, just the two of you." Yugi looked at him blankly. "It doesn't having to be anything spectacular, like dinner and a movie," he continued. "You can just like, go for a walk or go get a milkshake or something."

Yugi started chewing on his pencil again. "Maybe," he said.

"Just try to make it seem as normal as possible, not all sudden and different and coming out of nowhere."

"Yeah, I guess that makes sense." Atem turned back around to start lounging on his bed again while Yugi kept thinking. "Yeah. I can ask her if she wants to go to the park after the recital. She said her parents weren't able to come to it."

Atem nodded at him. "So when are you going to ask her?"

"Um," said Yugi. "I don't know? I guess I'll wait to see if something comes up in conversation." His eyes bugged out a little bit. "Jeez, now I'm getting all nervous about it because I have a plan."

Atem laughed again. "Don't worry about it so much, aibou. Anzu likes you."

Yugi bit down on his pencil hard and shook his head. "I don't know if I can do it."

Atem waved and opened his magazine back up. "Aww, don't get cold feet now. Just do what comes naturally; I bet you're like a regular Casanova inside. Everything will go fine."

* * *

Atem woke up the next day to the sound of chains jangling on the other side of the room. To his sleep-addled brain, they sounded like needles piercing his eardrums. He opened his eyes blearily and tried to look around without moving. It was the dead of winter, and he could tell by the window that it wasn't dawn yet; only Yugi's half of the room was lit. Yugi was standing in front of his mirror, trying to add another necklace to the two he already had on, his dog collar, and the bands and bracelets around his wrists. By all accounts, Yugi should have been getting ready for school, but that didn't usually include going through their chain and leather collection. Was he trying to wear every single thing they owned?

"What are you doing?" Atem managed to mumble at him.

Yugi looked at him in the mirror, startled. "Sorry," he whispered. "I didn't mean to wake you up."

"Why are you putting on so much stuff?" Atem asked; it came out more like croak than a question.

Yugi grabbed at the necklaces, and even by the dim light of the room, Atem could tell that he was blushing. "Oh. Um. Just 'cause of, um... Anzu." Atem squinted at him and pushed himself up on his elbows. "Should I not?" Yugi asked.

"Well, I..." Atem rubbed his face. It was a little too early to try to figure this out, and he struggled to get his mind into gear. "I don't know. You don't normally," he said finally.

"I know," he said, looking at the chains in his hand. He hesitated. "I think she thinks it's cool looking."

"She likes you for you, though. You shouldn't try to be... someone you're not," said Atem, avoiding saying 'me.' Yugi looked at him appraisingly, and Atem wondered if he'd heard that anyway. He rubbed his eyes again, trying to get the sleep out of them. "I can't decide for you. You can wear 'em if you want; I wasn't going to today." Yugi looked at them indecisively and pulled two of the necklaces off. He hesitated again and ditched the bracelets too.

Atem looked at the clock; dawn would be coming soon enough, and it wasn't worth going back to sleep. He rolled out of bed and stumbled for the small chest of drawers he had for his own clothes. He pulled out the set of robes he used for morning rituals in the winter; the upside of winter in Japan was that he didn't have to wake up at ridiculous hours; the downside was that it was freezing cold out in the morning. He threw them over his shoulder and stopped by Yugi's side of the room on his way to the shower. He put his head next to Yugi's and looked at him in the mirror; Yugi had started furiously brushing his hair again. "Go get 'er, tiger" he said.

"Nnngh..."

"You're going to have her wrapped around your finger. I know it."

"Agh."

Atem smiled at him and slipped away to the bathroom. Although his morning cleansing, disguised as a regular morning shower, was supposed to have its own sort of ritual to it, Atem's thoughts migrated back to Yugi and Anzu as he went through the motions. Was Yugi really trying to look or act like him? Should he have hidden the kohl while Yugi was distracted? He sighed as he scratched his fingernails through his scalp. The idea of Yugi doing anything motivated by jealously was immensely disturbing to him, and he hoped that Yugi wasn't trying to make some sort of last ditch effort on Anzu. Playing out of turn rarely worked well.

* * *

Atem had a hard time admitting it to himself, but deep in his heart of hearts, he really liked cold weather. Cold wind rushed into his nose and by his cheeks on his walk to work. He liked to imagine how his friends from Egypt would have reacted to it. Karim had acted like it was the apocalypse the handful of times he'd seen it rain; what would he have said if he saw _frozen_ water coming out of the air? Atem liked the big clumpy snowflakes that fell when it was just near freezing. And scarves. He especially liked scarves. The orange one he had wrapped around his neck right now clashed brilliantly with his hair and purple coat, and people actually gave him admiring looks as he walked by. Oh yes, he liked attention from strangers. That was probably the royalty talking. Or the narcissism. Atem's start time at work coincided neatly with lunchtime at school, so Atem took the opportunity to use his and Yugi's new phones.

"Ground control to commander Yugi: What is your mission status?"

There was a confused pause on the other end. "All bases have been cleared; Planet Dadfhuahd is now under Empire control?" said Yugi.

"No, no, no. Well, ok, you got the reference." Atem stopped at a Don't Walk signal. "Anzu. Have you popped the question to her yet?"

"What? What, no, don't talk about it like that; you're making it sound like I'm... like it's a bigger deal than it is."

Atem laughed. She was probably nearby. "Well, have you?"

Yugi hesitated. "No, not yet. It... it hasn't come up in conversation yet."

The light turned, and Atem crossed the street. "Well go do it. What are you waiting for?"

"Well, I'm just... waiting for the right moment. I have to do it right."

"It's better to do it wrong than to not do it at all."

"I know, I know. Maybe like, after the recital." There was a pause on the other end, and Atem could hear Anzu talking. "Oh, uh, Anzu wants to know if you're coming tonight," said Yugi.

"I don't get off until seven, so I probably won't make it. Tell her I'm sorry and that I wish I could." Was that a sigh of relief? Atem convinced himself that he imagined it. He waited while Yugi held the phone away from his mouth to tell Anzu. "Yeah, I want to be there so that I can see you in action, Casanova," he said when Yugi came back.

"Oh my god, stop calling me that."

"I think I have a new nickname for you."

"No!"

"Oh come on, Casa-chan, it makes you sound so classy."

"Stop making fun of me!" Atem heard someone in the background asking what he was doing. "Nothing!" said Yugi. "We're not talking about anything!"

"Aww, you can tell them that we're talking about how in love you are with Anzu."

"No!"

* * *

"_We'll dance together, lying for forever..."_

Atem was leaning on the counter with his chin in his palm, drumming the fingers on his other hand in time to the bland pop music playing on the radio. He was bored out of his mind. The electronics store he worked at had been dead the entire afternoon, and there was no indication that was going to change during the rest of his shift. He'd tried challenging his coworker Ayaka to a series of rock-paper-scissors, but she'd quickly surrendered once she realized it was impossible to win against him, and their sole customer had been staring at MP3 players long enough to make Atem wonder if he'd fallen asleep standing up.

"_Would you believe me if I said that I loved you? I don't."_

"Hey. Do you need help with those?" he asked.

The man glared at him, looking offended, then walked over to Ayaka and asked for help. She shot Atem a sympathetic look before leading him back to the display, and Atem rolled his eyes, frustrated again at being considered _gaijin_. It was the flip side of being an expatriate Egyptian pharaoh, he told himself. He had to remind himself daily that it was part of the lumps he had chosen for himself by staying, as much as the wary looks that Yugi's mother gave him when he walked around the house in religious garb and kohl, or the isolation from his friends because he didn't go to school, or this job.

"_I lie with my voice and you lie with your body..."_

Ayaka finished talking to the man, who didn't buy anything, and wandered back over to the counter. "You said your friend had a recital tonight?"

"Yeah," he said.

"You want me to finish out your shift for you? It's not like we're busy. I can fill out your time sheet and everything for you fo when you're supposed to leave."

Atem looked up at her with eyebrows raised as possibilities started swarming his mind. "Seriously?" he said. "That would actually be great."

"Yeah, no problem. I used to dance when I was little, and it was always really cool when my friends came to see me."

"Sweet." Atem ran to the back room and grabbed his coat and scarf. "Thanks, Ayaka!" he called as he headed out the front door.

"Oh hey, tell your other friend good luck with the girl," she said with a wink.

"Ha ha, oh yeah, I will. He's going to be so happy."

Cackling with glee, Atem left the store and started running down the sidewalk for the theatre. He was in the shopping district now and it was off in the arts district, not too far; he knew how to get there on foot, but he had no idea what bus lines ran in that general vicinity, so he decided to hoof it instead of risk getting lost. The recital would have just barely started, so the odds were good that he would make it there in time to see at least some of it and in time to catch Yugi in action.

Atem noticed a store selling flowers that was still open, and he stopped mid-step. Wouldn't that be a cute idea, he thought, to have Yugi give Anzu some flowers after the recital. Atem looked at the clock on his phone. He was going to be late anyway; he might as well put that time to use. "Maybe Casanova could use some help," Atem said to himself wryly.

Ten minutes later, he walked out of the shop with a small bouquet of pink flowers wrapped in paper; he'd worked out with the shopkeeper what would be appropriate, which had been another hellish experience with a stranger who didn't think he would speak Japanese. He started running again, hurrying both to get to see as much of the recital as he could and to keep the flowers from freezing in the chill.

Atem got to the theatre and snuck in; he could hear music playing, which meant he would have to be careful not to make a big show of arriving. He slipped in the back door of the auditorium; the current performance was some sort of pop number set to the same song that had been on the radio at work. He flicked open the program and found which part of the show they were on using the far away light of the stage; he had just missed intermission, so he wasn't going to get that chance to meet up with the guys. He looked out over the audience and tried to find his friends in the dark, but it was impossible. Instead, he carefully slipped into a seat on the end in the back row and set the flowers in his lap.

Atem watched the recital with a fair amount of interest; he knew nothing about dance except what he knew from ritual dances in his Egyptian life, and this was nothing like them. Higher purpose seemed to have been replaced by high art and skill, though he supposed that those had a high purpose of their own. He watched Anzu individually during the songs she was on stage. She was a good dancer, that was for sure, and even without relying on his memories of how Yugi felt around her, he understood why Yugi liked her so much. Underneath the tomboy was someone who cared deeply for his other self, and Atem didn't know how that couldn't be charming. The couple of times they'd talked about her since their split, Yugi had asked if he was interested in her, and Atem had always truthfully answered no; he was pretty sure that his disinterest stretched beyond Anzu and into anyone at all, though he didn't know why. Maybe he just hadn't properly settled into modern life with his combined identity yet.

At the end of the recital, Atem took advantage of his seat near the door to sneak back out of the auditorium as quickly as possible so he could catch his friends as they left their seats, but there were too many exits; he couldn't watch them all, and the lobby filled up quickly. Atem started cursing under his breath. He stood on his toes and scanned the crowd for his friends, but they were no where to be found. He ducked down and started weaving his way through the crowd, still looking and trying to pick out their voices in the din of the room; he had to get the flowers to Yugi before Anzu showed up. He finally spotted Jonouchi's blond head on the far side of the room, standing with Yugi, Honda, Bakura, and Otogi. Atem breathed a sigh of relief.

He snaked his way through the crowd, hurrying to their location while trying to protect the bouquet from getting smashed. Dancers were already among the family and friends crammed into the lobby; girls smiling with flowers of their own, getting their pictures taken; they were much more sweaty and glittery looking up close than they were on stage. Hurry, hurry, he thought. "Oi, guys!" he called out and waved the bouquet around above his head.

"Hey, Atem!" said Jonouchi, who stood on his toes and waved back. Atem ducked around a family while the four of his friends started walking towards him.

"Atem!" someone shouted behind him. He felt his heart stop dead.

It was Anzu. He turned around and tried to hide the flowers behind his back. This was not what was supposed to happen. "Uh, hey, Anzu," he said.

She stopped in front of him, smiling happily in her stage makeup and sweats. "I didn't think you were going to be able to come!" she said.

"I didn't either," said Atem, trying his hardest to sound nonchalant despite his plans collapsing around him. How could he get the flowers to Yugi without her noticing? He started waving the bouquet back and forth behind his back, trying to entice one of his friends to hurry up and grab it away from him before it was too late. "I got off work early, so I thought I would come by to see as much as I could. I missed the first half, but the rest looked really nice."

"Thank you," she said. She was giving him a starry-eyed look that was starting to make him really uncomfortable. He didn't know it was possible to feel so cornered in an open room. The rest of his friends getting close; if they were smart, they could break up the conversation and give him a chance to give the flowers to Yugi. "Are those for me?" she asked shyly, pointing around him at the bouquet.

Crap. Atem could feel his cheeks heating up in embarrassment, and he shrugged his shoulders helplessly. "Um, yeah, I... I guess they are," he said. There was no way he could pass them on at this point without looking stupid, so he unceremoniously handed them to her and shoved his hands in his pockets, defeated. Maybe he could give her some sort of explanation? "They're not –"

Anzu grabbed his face and kissed him.

Atem froze, stunned, his eyes wide open and his hands still in his pockets. It was over quickly, before he had time to pull away or breathe or realize he should have seen it coming. He gasped when they broke apart, and he stared at her for a second before it hit him how bad everything had just become.

Atem stood there, petrified, while he tried to think of something to say; his mind was dreadfully silent compared to the chattering of the crowd around them. Anzu smiled a little bit at him, waiting for him to do something. Someone wolf whistled behind him. Was it Otogi? Atem made a mental note to kill him for it. He closed and opened his mouth, but no words came out, and Anzu's face was starting to fall as she realized that Atem wasn't going to kiss her back romantically or sweep her up in his arms and carry her off into the sunset. Someone behind him started walking away very quickly.

"Hey, Anzu!" Honda and Bakura suddenly appeared at Atem's shoulder. "Good job dancing! We all liked watching it." Anzu turned to them, her attention diverted for a second. Jonouchi appeared on Atem's other side and punched him on the shoulder, giving him a very pointed look. Atem nodded desperately at him, then turned around and backed out the conversation as quickly as he could; he had to dodge Otogi, who looked like he had just figured out that something was wrong. Yugi was already gone.

Atem dashed as quickly as he could through the crowd in the direction he thought Yugi had gone; he had to hop to see the magenta spikes that were making their way to the exit. "Shit," he muttered to himself. He took off after him, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand; Anzu's aim had been off and she had kissed the top corner of his lips, leaving a streak of red lipstick behind.

He finally broke out of the crowd and escaped from the theatre, stopping on the sidewalk in front of it. He spun in place and tried to find Yugi amongst the people already leaving, but it was impossible to tell which way he had gone; he'd vanished into the cold early twilight. Atem bent over double, panting, his breath coming out in little white puffs. "Shit," he said again.

He'd already started making a mental list of Yugi's normal hiding spots when a hand grabbed his shoulder and whipped him around. He found himself looking into Jonouchi's angry face. "What the hell, man?" he said. Honda came running out of the theatre, trying to catch up to them. "You know how much he likes her! He was going on all day about how he had all these plans to ask her out!"

"I know he was!" said Atem, yanking himself out of Jonouchi's grasp. "He told me all about it! Hell, I helped him come up with ideas!"

"And what, you went and stabbed him in the back like that? Fucking awesome, Atem."

"No, damn it!" shouted Atem, already sick of being blamed for things that weren't his fault. "Those flowers were for _him_ to give to her. I was trying to find you guys so I could give them to him before she showed up. She wasn't supposed to sneak up behind me and grab me by the ears like that!"

Jonouchi and Honda both stepped back at that. "Seriously?" said Honda.

"Yes, seriously," said Atem. "Why would I do that to him? I don't even like Anzu like that."

Jonouchi opened his mouth to say something else, but stopped and turned to the theatre. Anzu, Bakura, and Otogi were coming out, all looking at them wide-eyed. Anzu hadn't put on a jacket; she started shivering when a gust of wind hit her. "Guys, what's going on?" she asked.

Atem looked around at his friends; it looked too much like an altercation for him to play it off like everything was normal. Jonouchi punched him on the shoulder again. Hell, he wouldn't be able to pretend that everything was normal ever again.

"Anzu, why did you kiss me?" he asked.

"I... just... thought..." she began. She stopped, her face turning bright red. Atem felt himself blushing too as he realized that this was a bad way of getting into it. She was already dying of embarrassment; he didn't need to make it worse.

"Look, Anzu, I... don't like you like that. I mean, I like you because you're my friend, and I really don't want to hurt your feelings, but I don't _like_ like you. And I know you do, and I don't know what to do about it." An awkward silence fell on the group again. Tears started forming in the corners of her eyes. "I'm sorry," he said.

She bit her lips self-consciously. "I wish you had told me sooner," she said.

"I do too." They stared at each other for a few seconds more while the rest of group shifted around, looking at each for a clue on what to do next. He heard paper crinkling. Atem finally broke the eye contact. "I need to go find Yugi." He pointed to the bouquet that she now held limply at her side. "Those flowers, they were supposed to be from him, not me. He's the Yugi that's actually in love with you."

He saw her take a deep breath, but he turned and walked away, unable to take any more drama. He heard Honda smack himself on the forehead. It probably wasn't a very classy move, leaving the rest of his friends to deal with Anzu's feelings, but he had reparations to make with his other self, and that took precedence over everything else.

* * *

Yugi was in the living room, playing _Zombire, Light and Dark_, when Atem finally crept back home; neither his mom nor Grandpa were in the house. Atem noticed that Yugi was playing in Dark Mode and was playing Zombire as evil instead of good, which he had never done before.

"Aibou?"

Yugi didn't look away from the game, but his expression soured. "Aibou," Atem tried again. Yugi said nothing.

"Yugi."

"I don't want to talk," said Yugi.

"Other self." Yugi looked over his shoulder at Atem and glowered at him. "I know you don't want to talk, but I want to at least have a chance to explain what happened."

"Yeah, well, you can go right ahead and do that," said Yugi as he turned back around and started pummeling another cop.

Atem sat down cross-legged on the couch next to him and waited for him to pause the game. Yugi continued beating up the good guys, clearly aiming to get the combos that would increase his total strength instead of his usual tactic of gaining allies and increasing his skill set. When it became apparent that pausing wasn't going to happen, Atem started talking anyway.

"You realize that there was a misunderstanding, right?"

"Obviously," said Yugi, not looking away from the game. Hi-jump, roll.

"I wasn't trying to hijack your plans. I don't like Anzu like that. I had no idea that was going to happen."

"Uh-huh." Smash, punch.

"I got those flowers for _you_ to give her, not me. I was literally just about to hand them to you when she jumped on me."

"Sure." Run, run, kick.

Atem sighed, exasperated, and got up and hit the power button on the game system. Yugi squawked angrily and glared at him again. "I haven't found a save point yet! Now I'll have to start over!"

"You've already missed the first one; it was behind a dumpster two blocks back. Can you listen?"

Yugi waved his arms around. "I am listening. I have been listening. I've been one hundred percent ears since you came in the room."

"Yeah, but you haven't been listening to what I'm actually saying."

"I am hearing what you say!" Yugi threw the controller down in a huff. "There was an accident. You don't like her like that. I know that. I have known that. Can you maybe just understand that I'm mad right now and I'm not going to magically get over it?"

"Aibou."

Yugi shook his head at him and folded his arms. "I'm _trying_ not to be mad at you, 'cause I know it's not your fault, but I'm mad at her and me and everyone and everything. I'm mad because she's never going to be interested in me as more than a friend. Mad that I'm never going to have a chance with her while you're around. Mad because I can't blame you, because you're not actually trying to steal her, so it must be there's something wrong with me instead."

"No, aibou. There's nothing wrong with you."

"There must be, because she's never going to like me and there's nothing I can do about it!"

"Yes she does, Yugi!" said Atem. "She likes you a lot."

"Well you could have fooled me, 'cause I'm not the one she was kissing!"

Atem took a deep breath and tried to calm down. "Yugi."

"It's you she likes, not me, and until I can figure out how to be you, she's never going to like me instead." Yugi drew his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them. Atem felt his heart breaking for him.

"Would you really want to be someone you're not just to be with her?" he asked.

"Yes!" said Yugi. He covered his eyes. "No. I don't know anymore." He pulled his hair in frustration.

A long silence followed. Yugi put his arms back around his legs and put his head on his knees and stared blankly at the floor. Atem sighed, at a lost for what to do next. Every element of the situation was out of his control: Yugi's feelings, Anzu's feelings, his own. Even if he could make himself pretend to be in love with Anzu, he wouldn't; it would be a lie to everyone involved, including himself. Besides, it would only cure her pain, and it would gouge an even deeper wound in Yugi. He couldn't do that to him. The only thing he wished he could have done was to have diffused the situation earlier, but there never had been an appropriate time. Like Yugi said, it wasn't a thing that came up in conversation. He'd just waited and ignored it and tried to be friendly but disinterested and tried to promote Yugi whenever he could. It hadn't been enough.

"I talked to her after you left," Atem said eventually. "I told her I'm not interested, told her about the flowers, told her about you." Yugi didn't say anything for a long while; he kept staring at the floor and one of his hands drooped down to start twisting at the carpet.

"What did she say?" he finally asked.

"She was disappointed. She said she wished I had told her earlier." Yugi nodded. "I wish I had too, because then I wouldn't have made an ass out of everyone. It's hard for me because she's still my friend and I don't want to hurt her feelings and I can't make her not like me."

Yugi shrugged. "What did she say about me?"

"She said that she had no idea you liked her," he lied. "I think you're too covert for your own good."

Yugi sighed bitterly, and silence fell over them again. Atem assumed the same posture as his partner and watched the power light on the TV flashing, reminding them that it was still on, even if the game wasn't.

"Did you know that I decided to ask her out today because I was afraid of this happening?"

Atem looked down at him. "I kinda wondered. I'm sorry that I showed up."

"It's ok. You were just trying to be a good friend." Yugi shook his head. "I don't know what I'm going to do when I go to school on Monday," he said.

"Me neither. I know how to start the romance, but I don't know how to fix it once its broken."

Yugi sighed and started pulling off the wristbands he'd been wearing all day. "Some masters of wooing the ladies we are."

* * *

Written for the Season Eight _Yu-Gi-Oh! _fan fiction contest. Round one: Spiritshipping.

**Author's note:** To be honest, I have no idea how extracurricular dance studios in Japan work or how they would do recitals, or whether it would be appropriate at all for a male friend to give a female friend flowers afterwards. I tried to be vague about it, but I apologize for my U.S.-centrism in this regard.

All games and songs referenced in this story were made up by me.


End file.
